15 Months

Oh that little face. I love it so much that I can’t stand it.
You eat. You eat so, so much. You pile it in your mouth and I have to slow you down and then you voice your displeasure at me.
Your favorite foods are still banana, watermelon, and graham crackers.
No more bottles. Just sippy cups. But not sippy cups with a straw. No siree. That will make you arch your back and scream. You are very good at that. With your tantrums. On weekends you have about four a day. They are short and sweet, and mama just walks away.
You’ve started pointing and babbling to try and tell me things. You can really only say mama, datdat still and I think I heard you say yes and grandma once this weekend.
You still love to look through books.
You don’t want to sit down for baths which you used to love. Instead, you hang on your knees over the side. So fun for mom to wash you.
You love to play with the water table on the deck. You can turn the handle and put balls down the ramp. If they get stuck you start making a whining noise and I fix it for you.
You crawl lightening fast, but are still not walking. Trying to get you walking by holding one hand instead of both as I steer you around.
Your sister was sitting in your little red car and you were so angry. You launched yourself at her and screamed until she got out. It is yours!
You love that car and being pushed around in it as well as being outside. You LOVE outside.

Medical Tests (long)

As I’ve written about in the past, certain members of my family, including myself, have a genetic mutation that involves colon polyps and missing teeth. Often, I have written about my dental adventures. My old geneticist (which I loved) left and have a new one that I don’t like as well. My last colonoscopy was in 2008 (yikes) and I’m supposed to have them every two years. Ooops. I’ve been busy with four jaw surgeries, a complicated pregnancy and a C-section. So shoot me. One was scheduled a few months ago, but P had to go out of town and I need a child wrangler and driver and meal provider.

Let me tell you what it is really like.

I finally had one scheduled for a Monday which means I could do the prep over the weekend and not have to take extra days off. This is my 3rd colonoscopy and my 5th endoscopy ( upper GI tract). All week I was apprehensive. I’m a worrier  The 1st time the prep was half lytely I think and went horribly – lots of cramping and vomiting and the prep was only “fair” (aren’t you glad you know this)! But no problems during or with results. All clear. (Except for stomach polyps – which apparently are no big deal). The 2nd one in 2008 went a little better. I had a two day prep – which means a laxative on the night two days before and a gallon of GoLytely the day before. This went better than the 1st one. Still had nausea and cramping and some chills. Again, no problems before or after. Prep was “excellent”.

This time I decided to eat a low residue diet two days prior to the prep. That means no fiber and is supposed to make things much easier. That is true! After Wednesday I had no fruit or veggies or nuts. I ate very lightly. Toasts, eggs, soup. Saturday and Sunday I had no food and I was SO HUNGRY this time. I had chicken broth, watered down Gatorade, Jello. I took Mirlax on Saturday and Sunday started the Gavilyte in the afternoon. The Gavilyte was a breeze! It wasn’t as thick and salty as the first two preps and I sucked down a cup with cherry flavoring (my own) every 15 minutes for two hours. Now I was supposed to get up two hours before the procedure and take the rest but I didn’t. I drank mine and kept drinking chicken broth and water until everything was clear. Then I stopped and just rehydrated with clear fluids the rest of the night. I felt fine! I even unpacked six boxes of moving stuff that day.

The next morning everything went fine and I was a little sniffly when they took me back. Sometimes (I’ve had “twilight” anesthesia eight times before) I get a little hit of something before they take me back to relax me. I remember the nurse giving me something and the room went kind of spinny. But then I woke up. OH YES I DID. Right at the start. And I was screaming. It was painful and felt like a truck was in my neither regions. They kept yelling at me to relax and I was in and out. Apparently they gave me another Versed and Midozlam to kill a horse. It didn’t work. They cancelled the upper endoscopy. Because of the sedation problems.

When I came out I was hardly loopy. I wasn’t happy either. What happened? The MD told me that either my anxiety caused the sedation not to work (WHAT????), or that I took a drugs and/or painkillers frequently (WHAT?????) so that may have not caused it to work. I am still so angry about it. Something happened. With the IV or the drugs or something.

I’m not going back here. Now I have to worry that IV sedation won’t work. I wanted an investigation to be launched, but I haven’t done that yet. I’m pretty angry about being treated like I was crazy.

The good news is that there were no polyps and everything was fine.